Larry Poynor caught the entertainment bug early on, not a terribly difficult thing to do growing up in a place like Abilene.
Aside from being a strong market for country music thanks to the tireless efforts of Slim Willet and others, Abilene locals were also quick to latch on to the new rock n' roll sound and the Key City was probably one of the first towns to get behind Elvis.
One of the first local artists to make the jump from country music to rock n' roll was the "West Texas Wildman" Dean Beard. Dean and his Crew Cats were a mainstay of the Abilene music scene for a number of years and many a Big Country local remembers Dean and his group. For Larry it was a show at the Paramount Theater in downtown Abilene that stands out. When the piano pounding Beard took the stage he groped, err... grabbed, the microphone in such a way that he drew both the ire and applause of those in attendance. Music, it would seem, can certainly make people take notice and react.
Another memorable experience came a year or three later when Larry caught the Spirals at the Taylor County Fair. Part way through the show the drummer moved to the front of the stage, turned his back to the audience and then pulled a comb from his pocket to fix his DA before leading the combo through a rendition of "Fools Rush In". Larry, a drummer himself, thought that was a pretty slick little move.
Within a short time the stage and studio would become Larry's life. It's hard- really hard- to keep track of everywhere Larry has been and everyone he has played with over the years. He even played a stretch with Glen Goza just after "Goshamody, Whatabody" stopped hitting regionally. But his first gig of note was as the drummer for a regional group known as the Feathers and that might be as good a place as any to start.
THE FEATHERS
The Feathers were a group that seems to have 'taken flight' in the West Texas town of Abilene in 1963. Aside from Larry Poynor on drums, the group also included brother Gary Poynor on bass, Pepper Martin on lead guitar, Bill Cleaver on rhythm guitar, and Bill Ray playing sax. Sometime in or around 1964 the Feathers had found themselves booked into an extended stand at the Bel Aire lounge in Hobbs, New Mexico. Bill Cleaver was not long for Hobbs and bowed out shortly after the Feathers touched down.
The honky tonks and night clubs of Hobbs weren't for the faint of heart. The stage might start off as a rush, before slowly becoming a grind. And the clientele could be a bit demanding. Getting booked into an engagement in Hobbs - which might last up to a month or even longer- was like a tour of duty in a sand blasted combat zone. Patrons, some still reeking of oil as they barreled through the door in a sprint for the bar, could sometimes care less who was on stage. They were wanting to forget the rig they had just come off of and would be going back to in short order. The band was a distraction to dance to. Or fall in love to. Or fight to. A group like the Feathers were the defacto crowd control as much as they were crowd pleasers. Some of these places were the sort that closed long enough for the staff to sweep out the trash along with the comatose and restock the coolers before starting up for the next crowd. The money was good. A band learned to be a band. You did not, however, become famous. A month straight at Al's State Line didn't catapult anybody to overnight stardom. It could be a grind for sure.
The Feathers' manager brought in a replacement who took over on drums and Larry- one of those guys that tick you off to no end because they can play ANYTHING- took up the vacant rhythm guitar spot. The new drummer for the Feathers was Teddy Neely, formerly of Taylor County Fair stars the Spirals. No idea if Teddy's comb made any appearances at the Bel Aire.
Once the Feathers had wrapped up their engagement in Hobbs they headed north to see Norman Petty, but before they had even put a foot in the door of the fabled Clovis studio they were convinced to head down to Odessa where Herb Graham was branching off from the nightclub business into music production with his Summer Star production company. The well-rehearsed Feathers left Summer Star studios having recorded two tracks, "Them Onions" (co-written by Larry and Teddy) and "The Dummy" (a Poynor original).
The band was then off to Las Vegas where a job had been lined up to back Sue Thompson, hot on Hickory Records at the time. While the band waited for Sue they took a job at the Pussycat A-GoGo and once it became apparent that the tour was not going to come together the Poynor brothers moved on.
THE FEATHERS - Them Onions b/w The Dummy (Veep 1200)
After the Poynors had exited, Graham managed to place the Summer Star recordings with D/FW mover, shaker, and snake oil salesmen extraordinaire Major Bill Smith who then struck a deal with the nationally distributed Veep label. The single appeared in 1964 and disappeared almost as quickly.
The group then became the Teddy Neely Four, lasting for one early 1966 release on Graham's own Zola label ("Comin' Home" practically defines the term BIG BEAT). In the spring of the same year a second Zola single was issued as the Sonics. Neely was soon off to California and a recording contract with Capitol before becoming Ted Neeley and eventually taking a career(life?) defining role as the lead in Jesus Christ Superstar. Pepper Martin went on to play in Foxx, another "Graham band" as the locals say.
After Las Vegas Larry returned to Odessa, Texas where a gig led to a Denver engagement for him and his combo. The trip to Denver fell apart before it even really got started. "I was the only one over 21,” said Larry. “Before we finished our first night in Denver, the cops came in and checked IDs. I was the only one not arrested because of my age." Once the guys were bailed outta jail it was back to the road.
THE DUKE CITY
By 1966 Larry and Lynne Poynor were living in Albuquerque. And what a time to be in Albuquerque! The Duke City scene was absolutely exploding in '66. All across the city there were dozens of excellent combos making noise, gathering fans, and issuing records, among them the Striders, the Saliens, King Richard & the Knights, the Kreeg, the Choab (aka Chob) and the Plague. Aside from all of the local companies national record labels like Challenge, Look, and Columbia were signing local bands and artists to deals. With all of the attention that Albuquerque was getting it was as good a' place to be as anywhere else.
Albuquerque gave Larry the opportunity to focus on music, both writing and playing. He and his wife Lynne picked up steady work at the Fireside Inn. Located on busy east Central Avenue, the Fireside Inn was one of the first watering holes to greet white-knuckled drivers finishing the 20 mile drive through Tijeras Canyon. And according to Larry a stop at the Fireside Inn could be interesting, to say the least.
"Johnny, the owner of The Fireside Inn, was quite a character. One day I came into the club and there were holes around the clock on the wall. Johnny and a pal were drunk after the club had closed for the night and used the clock for target practice.... the clock was never hit."
"Another time some customers at a table were messing with one of the go-go dancers so Johnny takes his pistol (it was so big it looked like a cannon) and told them to leave the girls alone as he's waving the pistol in their face. We never had any more trouble with them."
Not all Fireside Inn stories involved guns. There were hippies, too.
"Johnny hired a waitress. She looked like a hippie and lived up in the mountains around Albuquerque. Her husband was just as weird. One day he brought in a sheet of plywood upon which he had painted a collage and propped it up against the back wall of the club. He said it was for sale. It sat there about a month and one night he came in and stood back and gave it a long look. Finally he said 'Well, no wonder. It's upside down.' The painting never sold."
Local characters aside, the Fireside Inn also drew a few celebrities.
"One night we were doing a set and some musicians came in the door and sat down. Well, on our break they asked if they could sit in. I told 'em yeah and they asked if they could bring in a couple of amps. So when they got ready I asked the name of their group.... he tells me Dion and the Wanderers. I announce them and off they go. I'm sitting in the audience listening and somebody taps me on the shoulder and asks if that's Dion of the Belmonts . Well I didn't know what Dion looked like so I asked him if he was the one with the Belmonts and he said that all he could say was that he was Dion and they were on their way to L.A. to be on Where The Action Is. So I never gave it another thought. About 3 weeks later I'm watching Where The Action Is and here is the group, Dion and The Wanderers, formerly Dion and The Belmonts. I was really surprised."
In 1966 another interesting visitor stopped by the Fireside. Gene Vincent and his wife Jackie had come to Albuquerque to visit Gene's parents and have Gene's leg looked at the local Veteran's Administration Hospital. Gene introduced himself and said that he would soon be going to England. "He wanted to know if I wanted to go and be the opening act," remembers Larry. "I'd heard a million of these stories, but I was nice and sorta played along. He said that first he had to go in the hospital and have his legs operated on and told me to come up to the hospital and visit and we'd talk over the tour. So I said sure and went on my way. I never went to the hospital because I figured he was just another quack." Gene, always nervous about his crippled leg, got scared when his doctors started talking about amputation so he jumped town. "About 6 months later I was reading Billboard magazine. It was an article about Gene Vincent and he was about to go on tour in England. It said he had just got out of the hospital after having his legs operated on. I was too young to eat a gun so it was just an 'Oh Well'. I had a shot and blew it." Probably for the best... Gene's tours by this time had a way of imploding.
One area Larry didn't blow it in was lacing his songs with other local Albuquerque artists, though none of his songs were hits. The Saliens recorded a song called "Black Leather Britches", which still remains unreleased. Another Poynor original, "Animal Crackers" by the John Wagner Foundation, was placed on the nationally distributed Look label.
DEWAYNE QUIRICO
Another Fireside Inn visitor and recent transplant to the Duke City was north Texas drummer DeWayne Quirico (pronounce Care-ico), fresh off a crazy year on the West Coast. DeWayne's first professional gig was as a member of Sam Gibbs' Musician Service. Sam booked out of Wichita Falls, Texas- his biggest act being the Miller Bros.- and sent his entertainers out on long tours and engagements at fairs, military bases, and casino lounges. In the early 60s DeWayne picked up a spot with Doug Bowman and the Roadrunners, no strangers to the Hobbs nightlife, and spent a bit of time playing drums in the group. Doug ran his Roadrunners hard and DeWayne eventually walked away from the group in Nevada.
By late 1964 DeWayne, and his drums, were in Santa Fe, New Mexico where he ran into guitarist Billy Webb. Billy and drummer Lloyd Dalton had just taken leave of the Fuller brothers down in El Paso. As soon as he could find a ride DeWayne piled his entire kit into a Mustang and was headed south for El Paso where he met up with Randy Fuller at the Red Rooster Drive In and talked about joining Randy and Bobby. The next day he auditioned with Bobby himself and after a few practices in the famed Fuller home the new group was off to California and on their way to stardom.
In their rather short existence the Bobby Fuller Four would go on to become one of the greatest American bands of all time, a perfect merger of sight and sound. And what a sound! These guys cut one of the greatest rock n' roll songs ever when they remade "I Fought The Law". Regardless of the original source "I Fought The Law" will ALWAYS be a Bobby Fuller Four song. The legs may belong to Sonny Curtis and Crickets, but face it... the heart and soul belongs to the combo that cut it in Bob Keane's LA studio in 1965. And a big part of the credit for making the song what it is belongs to DeWayne Quirico and his incredible drumming... you know that what's coming is gonna be good as soon as you hear that drum roll at the intro.
DeWayne is also heard powering the BF4 through such classics as the outstanding "Let Her Dance", “Another Sad & Lonely Night", and "Never To Be Forgotten". The genius thing of Wayne's drumming was that he was often heard beyond the standard 4/4 beat or shuffle. There were always extra little rolls or snaps of the hi-hat or switched up beats thrown in that kept things interesting.
1965 was a big year for the boys from El Paso. There were TV appearances, an album, high profile concerts, a big engagement at PJ's, and songs on the radio. And 1966, with "I Fought The Law" climbing the charts, stood to be even bigger. But if it was up to Keane and Bobby it appears as if '66 was destined to be the year of Bobby Fuller, rather than the Four so DeWayne was up and gone and decided Albuquerque was the place to be.
Albuquerque was a time of 'transition' for DeWayne. After a couple of years of constant appearances and gigs and studio work he found the Duke City to be a more laid back affair, the only constants being his drums and his girlfriend. And then in mid-July the news of Bobby Fuller's death broke.
While in town DeWayne had a few things going on including a short lived gig with a blind piano player and a stint at Caravan East, but his goal was to just take a break and play with a long range goal of staying busy as a session player. Somewhere around town he met Larry and the two began working together. For a time the Poynors even took in DeWayne and his girlfriend allowing them to share their apartment.
THE BAD SEED
THE CIRCUS - Bad Seed (You're A Bad Seed) b/w Burn, Witch, Burn (Offe 101)
Armed with a handful of songs, Larry and DeWayne hit John Wagner's basement studio sometime between the fall of 1966 and early 1967. Larry hoped to get a couple of his compositions on tape with a secondary goal being the creation of his own publishing company and this would be done under the name Po Dunk. In tow were one or two members of local combo the Plague, responsible for the the INCREDIBLE "Go Away" on Epidemic, and another local musician named Herman Tower. Herman, a lone wolf of sorts, was always on the move between groups and gigs.
Of the songs that made it into Wagner’s studio, Larry’s most ambitious idea was a song called "Bad Seed". There was also a song about a witch, based on a poem Larry had written in junior high called “The Day the Yaks Came To Town”.
"Bad Seed" opens with an almost excruciating harp jab from Herman Tower before giving way to a hypnotic rhythm line from Larry's bass and the organ, likely played by a member of the Plague. And then comes Larry's snarling opening- I was born in a taxi in a thunder storm... I was... and right away they sent me to the Parchman Farm- and what follows is line after line detailing the struggle of one who is born into the worst of circumstances and forced to live tough and live to survive. This ain't no charmed life. The pulsing, rolling go-go rhythm is punctuated throughout by bluesy harp wailing while Quirico's drumming is steady and unrelenting and jazzy. There's almost too much going on, at times bordering on chaos. But just when you think the train has done run its course, just as it seems it's run out of steam, a snap of the hi-hat pulls it all back on track and it barrels on along. I would almost hesitate in using the word "punk" when describing "Bad Seed" as it is a term so overused that it is almost generic and meaningless at this point. But with attitude to spare, both lyrically and instrumentally, this is just about as punk it got in the 60s.
While Larry and his assembled caste eased the pace just a bit on "Burn Witch Burn" the lyrics are no less shocking. If "Bad Seed" is a warning then "Burn Witch Burn” is a reflection of deeds done.
I grabbed the old hag and I threw her on the ground,
Made sure that she was gagged and bound
Just before I killed 'er I heard her say
“Gonna see the devil on Black Wednesday”
"Burn Witch Burn" employs one instrument not heard on "Bad Seed"- a rhythmic clinking sound. "That was an empty Heineken beer bottle" recalled Larry and was played by DeWayne during one of the dub-ins. Details are fuzzy, but the bottle was probably DeWayne's idea. Randy Fuller had played an empty Coke bottle during the BF4's "Let Her Dance" session at Bob Keane's studio in 1965. The empty soft drink bottle on "Let Her Dance" sounds happy. An empty beer bottle on "Burn Witch Burn" sounds ominous. (I've included a YouTube clip of the Bobby Fuller Four performing "Let Her Dance" below) And the blood curdling scream... according to Larry it was an impromptu addition from Herman who thought it fit.
As for the subject matter... "I write off the wall stuff," says Larry. I should say so.
THE CIRCUS COMES TO ODESSA
In early '67 the Poynors returned to Odessa and Larry assembled a group including himself, Lynne (vocals), brother Gary (bass), and Abilene boys Hubert Giddens (organ) and Paul Westbrook(soon replaced by Tommy McCamey on drums), called the group The Circus, and sent the tapes of "Bad Seed" and "Burn Witch Burn" off to Houston Records where the record was pressed in March of 1967. "(I thought) having a record out would make us all stars... Ha!"
"The people that pressed the 45 came up with the name for the label," says Larry of the Offe single. "I don't remember how many copies were pressed, but it was the bare minimum." I would guess that to probably be 100. The records received by the band were either given away or sent out to a few radio stations. With the band acting as distributors by handing out singles to friends and radio disc jockeys the record never made it to any stores or any of the jukebox one-stops. Add to the lack of distribution the band's short existence and you have a record that is as easy to find as water in West Texas. Whatever copies of the 45 weren't given away in 1967 were destroyed in a flood in the early 80s, save couple of salvageable copies (one of the nicer ones featured here).
The next stop was a television show in Dallas. "I had arranged with a booking agent back east to book us. The day that we were supposed to leave, the entire band quit. None of them wanted to leave town so Lynne and I migrated to Las Vegas." And the Circus, a band that had never really even got off the ground, was done.
Lynne and Larry separated after she joined Wayne Newton as one of the Jive Sisters.
And Larry... the man never has stopped.
Larry developed a partnership with former Circus drummer Paul Westbrook, including partially funding a studio Reid ran out of Cleveland, Mississippi. At least one recording is known to have been released from this venture- The Comin' Days' nifty remake of "Last Time" on Peak. While he receives production credit for the single Larry's only involvement was studio funding and the writing credit for the record's flip side, "Mr. Earth Man".
There was also a release on Track Records, another Westbrook label, under the name Buck Shot and the Incredible Barb-Wire String Band. The single includes a remake of "I Fought The Law" with a rural flair b/w the hard rockin' "Stone'd Again". I'll have to came back to that one at a later date.
In the mid-70s there was another stint in Odessa, this time in a combo called OAK with Larry Brumfield, Jan Lessard, and Don Stice. Another Lessard/Poynor act was the Measles, billed as “the most contagious band in West Texas.”
At present Larry and his wife live in East Texas. He's still constantly writing songs and still constantly recording.
_________________________________
The Bobby Fuller Four 'perform' the AMAZING "Let Her Dance" on Shivaree, July 3, 1965. DeWayne Quirico on drums.
________________________________
*Thanks to Larry Poynor who endured what must have seemed like a million questions regarding this very short period of time in his life. I've talked to a few movers and shakers from the West Texas music scene and 99% of them have been extraordinarily patient, generous, and gracious. Larry has gone above and beyond even that. Whatta guy! Thanks as well for use of the photos and the record.
*Thanks to DeWayne Quirico who was nice enough to share his stories regarding Doug Bowman, Albuquerque, Bobby Fuller and LA, and so much more. DeWayne and Randy Fuller will be playing the Norton Records 25th Anniversary shindig in New York this November.
*Thanks to Dick Stewart for the use of the John Wagner advertisement from the Lance. Dick's Lance Records website can be found HERE. There's lots to look at and buy, including original 45s and copies of the Lance. Dick continues to produce the Lance Monthly and has also recently published a book, Eleven Unsung Heroes of Early Rock and Roll. Dick Stewart also provided details on Herman Tower.
*Thanks to Mike Dugo of 60s Garage Bands who spent a bit of time pouring through issues of the Lance and provided the Wagner Studio scan. Mike's site is the BEES KNEES.
*Thanks as well to Steve Erickson of the Plague and John Wagner who took time to answer questions.
*And thanks to "MopTop" Mike Markesich for some background information as well. Mike was the first person to track Larry down in regards to the Circus a few years back. Be watching for his Teen Beat Mayhem tome. Someday it shall happen.
*Judith Richards Shubert of the Geneology Traces blog (found HERE) was kind enough to allow me the use of the Red Rooster Drive Inn postcard.
